The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-04-24
WOMEN OF NOTE.
Points Of Personal Interest Regarding Litera.
ry and Other Woman Celebrities.

Special to tho Indianapolis Journal
NEW YORK, April 23.-Mrs NJ. Louise |
Thomas, vennie Junes successor in the presi-
dency of Sorosis will this summer rent instead
OF occupying. her farm. Mrs Thomas has
been known so long as the .woman.farmer of
Tacony" that it will seem odd to picture her in
other surroundings. Her title has never been
very exact one. however, for the Manse a.
Tacony contains but twenty acres or there
ahouts Of cleared land altogether, and has never
admitted of very extended agricultural oper-
atoms. The place is in reality summer home,
bought by Mr.. Thomas, retired clergyman of
of the Universalist Church. some years before
his death; but, small as it is. Mrs. Thomas made
it wanderful example of the results to be ac-
complished by woman's practical sense and
business skill Her herd of Attorneys. though
small one, contained some of the best stock
in the country. her horses were thoroughbred
Morgans, and her bees--Mrs. Thomas is one of
the most successful bee-keepers in the Union
made her ten thousand pounds OF honey in a
year. l put my verbs in the past tense. for all
these things are no more. Mrs. Thomas was
burned out last November through the careless
ness of some tramp who found access to her
ing point of her efforts a second time, and will
live in New York city in future at pretty
spot she has bought beyond the Harlem at
Fordham.
Mrs. Mary L. Barr. who is making herself
known a writer of Scotch dialect stories,
hardly touched pen to paper up to the age of
ffty-four. She lost her husband who was Mil
itary Governor of Texas, and seren children in
of .four fropo ~olO
fever. and bund herself left with four little
ones and so cents on her hands. In course of
time she drifted, every body drifts nowadays,
to New York and became q governess in the
family OF one of A. T. Stewards partners. Her
first tale, which was written at the request and
| to crafty the whim of her employer, dealt with
| life in the old days in Texas and found pub
Usher with ease. She has gone on writing with
| progressive rapdity since and her exubsrant
| vitality defes time. Energy throbs in every
movement, and there is overlooking life in the
| nodding of the bows in the bonnet on her head
| Miss Alice Freeman, the president of Welles-
| ley College, is young woman whom most of
| her sex look upon born under a lucky star.
| With her erect figure dark hair, big brown
| eyes and the glow in her cheeks, she looks tn.
embodiment OF nineteenth century womanhooG,
| conscious OF strength, rejoicing in opportu.
nities and eager to put her just realized DOW
ers to the proof. Miss Freeman is graduate
of Michigan University, as are SO many
| of the teachers and successful women
| workers of the day. AS woman her
| influence over other women is marked. Pro.
fessors and students Of Wellesley alike are loyal
| to her, and commencement visitors have odd ex-
| periences now and then when they seek the
presidents room of an evening and find dis
| consulate graduate or two sobbing away in the
darkness over forgotten glove bit of lace,
while the unconscious owner is enjoying the
| festivities of the hour some where outside.
| The trustees of Columbia College, at their cen l.
tennal iubilation, last week conferred the degree
of Doctor OF Letters upon Amelia b Edwards aud
M,c1E 1sI- n>-s
upon Maria Mitchell, professor of astronomy at
Vassar College. In these honors the women
were associated with such as Andrew D.
White. George William Curtis, George Bancroft,
| York. and others not less eminent. Truly the
world moves and !even the most conservative
institutions are thrust forward though haltin e
with an unwilling step. by its motion.
| Miss Clara Barton, OF Red Cross fame Is a
Massachusetts woman, daughter of one of
Mad Anthony Wayne's7 old soldiers They
say that she organized the first public school
ever started in Bordentown, N j. and she was
a coDyist in the Patent Office at Washington for
some years before the war. The first gun of the
Rebellion brought her to the 'front.' and in the
work OF the sanitary commission none more
devoted in the field. She spent the last cent
she possessed in organizing bureau of records
| of missing men of the armies and SO useful did
it prove that Congress voted her SIS, 900 FOX
services to the government AS president of the
| Red Cross Society, whose ensign waves over
America. Europe and the best part of Asia, she
is the only woman living at the head of a phlan.
throplc scheme of any such magnitude, stand
ing. asst does. for world wide benefcence on
wheels Miss Bartons gift for organization re-
verses the order of talent usually ascrbed to her
sex. She has few equals 10 mapping out a plan
as comprehensive whole, while many a lesser
mortal can put her to utter rout in the manage
ment of details. Miss Barton's figure is q con
Trajectory one. She looks massive; she is on
closer view, as slender and 1.-the young girl
Mira. Lucy G. Lille dictates ali that she writes
to stenographers. two of whom she has at hel
service, one in the morning and one in the after
noon each day. Mrs. Lille does not look like 3
woman with work enough on her hands 70,
children's stories and erown-up peoples Store.
to drive one wild, it would seem, between nov
and fall. She Is smooth browed. unru1fied
looking woman. with hazel eyes and an unaux
ious way. Mrs Lille is of the literary
women who are famous housekeepers as well
aud she makes for the three children she ha
adopted the contest of homes.
Mrs. Kate Epson Clarke is another woma,
author and journalist who is as proud of he
kitchen as of her library. In her Brookly,
menage, with the help of one servant she ha
been known to spread course lunch for part
OF guests which kept them some four hours and
half at table, and which, the salads excepted, wa
, OF domestic manufacture with pardonable prid
she assured therl. in every single particular.
Mrs. Durant the widow OF the founder O
Wellesley, is one OF the most active women i
; Boston, dividing her time between. the Youn
! Mems Christian Association, the money 70
. whose large building came 10 large part fror
her pocket, and the interests of the girls at tn
college, to whose well being she IL devoted
, George William Curtis's daughter Elizabeth
| interests herself decidedly in the working girls
} as distinguished from the young ladies of le
sure and has handed those of Staten islam
into a Working Womens Guild, with readih
rooms, library and pleasant evening recreations
which showing themselves Of decided pra,
teal good.
A Reyolyipc Trunk